When containers have to be emptied the methods adopted depend to a large extent on the contents of the container. In the case of flowable material, such as granules, gravitational discharge it the preferred option. To facilitate this form of emptying a container attempts have been made to develop containers which have a bottom discharge means. For a number of reasons containers with a bottom discharge incorporated in a base or pallet forming part of the container have not found favor with users.
An alternative is to tilt the container, usually in a tilting device on which the container is mounted, to the extent required to cause the contents to flow from the container over a top edge of one of the container sides. To provide a generally uniform rate of discharge, which is the normal requirement, the tilt of the container has to be continually adjusted. This discharge method is labor and/or time intensive and is therefore not favor.
Another discharge method is to mount a hood with a discharge opening fitted with a flow controlling device to the open top of the container and then support the container in an inverted condition to allow material in the container to gravity discharge through the discharge opening of the hood. The challenge with this method is how to invert the container and support it in the inverted manner in the most efficient and economical manner. The present invention addresses this challenge.